I Know It's Over
by BDG
Summary: Very AU, I guess older!Arya&Gendry, Gendry's POV. One-shot based on The Smiths song "I Know It's Over", what happens if Gendry gets a letter from Arya, years later? Please read and review, thanks :


**Disclaimer:** I don't own anything

**A/N:** I believe this is very AU but I'm not sure, you should know that I haven't finished "A Clash of Kings" yet but I'm sort of familiar with other books but still this is probably very AU. The Smiths' song which gave its name to the fic, "I Know It's Over" was my inspiration so there are direct references to some of the lyrics, therefore I recommend listening to it. This has been a song I wanted to work with over some time and suddenly it felt very Arya&Gendry to me. I hope you will like it, please review and I apologize for any grammar, spelling and punctuation mistake. Thank you.

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**I Know It's Over**

_"...I know it's over_  
_And it never really began_  
_But in my heart it was so real..."_

_-The Smiths_

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"Arya." he said, his voice was hoarse as he gently stroked the writing _Winterfell_ on the unopened envelope with his stained thumb. "Arya" he murmured again, his voice reflected his sorrow and he wanted to cry because he feared, he feared what his beloved Arya might have written to him but the foolish boy in him leaked a sweet delusion to his numbed brain, numbed by the absence of the only human being he felt ever so deeply for, even though he didn't know what exactly he felt for her, he knew that it was the most intense feeling he ever had to carry within his heart, the heaviest burden he had to live with. _Maybe_, the fool in him insisted, and he couldn't take the suspense any longer, and so he gave in and let his fingers leave stains on the pearly white envelope. He held the very well folded letter gently, the letter that Arya folded and he look for her fingerprints on the letter even though they were invisible to a mans sight, he knew they were there, all over the paper, just like himself. Arya was with him, constantly and he did not need a voice nor a wind to feel her presence, she was under his skin, whispering him words of courage every morning, she was there when he was forging, daring him to exceed himself, she was in his dreams, loving him in every way that a woman can love a man. He finally brought himself to open the letter which read:

_Dear Genry; _

_-_Her very first words encouraged him, she knew he was a Ser now but she didn't address him as such, it was a warm opening considering they haven't seen each other for an unit of time that felt as if it was a decade to Gendry.-

_I know it has been sometime but before you go on reading this letter, you should know that I do not have any resentful feelings, not to you but only to the life, itself. _

-He wanted to burst out a laughter, she sounded nothing like the Arya he knew, the Arya he loved but still he couldn't deny that her words succeeded in giving him hope and freeing his heart of its darkness.-

_Even this feels wrong, Gendry._

-"Oh, Gods" he thought, petrified-

_Even writing this letter feels unnatural, I'm not the kind of girl who writes letters with her fancy plum, but I have to. I don't know why I needed to tell you when I heard of this news but sometimes I believe you are the only one who has known me for who I really am, I have to tell someone how this made me feel and it has to be you because it's you, the boy with the bull helmet. _

-A smile appeared on his dry lips as he reminisced of the very first memories he had with her.-

_I'm getting married next month._

-Just like that, his world collapsed. Her words were as keen and tough as her sword and they cut even deeper than it. He was unable to think and breathe, he nearly collapsed on his table, his hands shook with anxiety as he reached to hold his head, he was breathing heavily and he had lost all his will to continue, not only to reading but to living. So, she had found a son of some lord, a handsome one, a rich one, a highborn and she loved him. He imagined her laughing with her fiancé and he felt dead. So dead that he could feel the soil falling over his head, he didn't feel a bit more alive then a corpse, a cold corpse. He wanted to yell, cry, punch, roar, hit if he had to, he wanted to knock something over, kick, break but he couldn't. His anger was like raging, boiling hot lava but he couldn't burst it out, and this lava rotted in him burning his heart, his lungs, his stomach, his veins in the way and he was dead. Yet his eyes kept reading, without his will.

_No, I'm not getting married, I'm being sold to some prick. It doesn't matter who he is, he isn't meant for my happiness but the benefit of Winterfell. Robb keeps telling me that I am to marry that prick and smile as the alliance he seeks -although he would never admit- so desperately is made. I sometimes wonder how he is even related to me. Marrying me off to a lord? Expecting me to be a wife, a mother, a lady? I am no lady. Remember when I told you that?_

_-_He did so very vividly.-

_I haven't changed and I will not change, not for a boy, not for an alliance, not for my own brother. I am me and no one can accept that. No one, except you._

-At that precise moment he thought, she was going to declare her love and his heart beat like it didn't in such a long time but he knew that wasn't Arya-like. Arya would have never declared her love through ink and paper, Arya would never declare her love. It didn't mean she didn't have a loving heart, she did, the most loving heart he ever had the fortune to encounter.-

_I'm not writing these words so that you come and save me. You know that I am my own savior and I don't think the thought has even crossed your mind because you know me well, very well. I would be lying if I said I wasn't sad, and I can't lie to you, you see through me. I will say that I am sad and stop there. Why am I sad? There are various reasons, the first one is the obvious one and the others, I won't be telling you because they are no use to you but you should know, I won't forget it._

_Arya._

"_It_"? He knew very well what she meant by "_it_" and "_it_"haunted him too, in his dreams, in the dark and in the light and not a single day passed that he didn't regret, that the thought of "_it_" nibbled his brain. "_It_" could have meant anything but he knew what she meant, no, no, he felt what she meant, with his heart, his mind and his soul. "_It_" meant the relationship they shared and suddenly, his fresh pain left its place to an old sorrow of his. That sorrow had been like an old friend to him now, at first it was burning his insides, opening new wounds and making him bleed but now, the sorrow still hit him with the same force and yet he had gotten used to it, it only left a painful smile on his face but one could see his sorrow in his eyes.

It was now evident that he would not sleep that night. He remembered over and over again. What he remembered the first was a surprise to him. As he poured a beer to his old and broken cup, a flash of Aryas dark hair appeared in his view, so vividly that he felt as if he reached out he would touch it, hold it between his fingers and let it slip from them, leaving a silky feeling on his fingers.

Her hair was longer now and it kept getting in her sight. She tried to wave it away with her head but her hair was too long for her to do as such, so she put whatever she was holding down and pushed a pinch of her hair behind her ear, that was the first time, it really sank in him that she was a girl. A girl with long hair and fierce eyes.

After his second beer, he remembered one night they were in the Brotherhood together it was cold, so cold he trembled and coughed, he felt like throwing up but Arya lay next to him, as she always did, stiffed as ever and didn't even flinch. She was strong. _Arya of the Winterfell_, he remember thinking,_ is nothing like a highborn_. She was strong yet as the early morning light hit his face, he opened his eyes and saw her face against his chest and her arms around him. It wasn't the first time she had them around him but it was the first time he felt ashamed of holding a young girl in front of all those blokes. It was an intimate moment. It was the first time he felt as if it was an intimate moment to hold her and he wished they were in a place he could hold her, forever. It was the first time his body acknowledged her curves and his heart responded.

One more cup of beer and he would remember the time he wanted to kiss her. Months had passed since she pressed her body against his and fell asleep. With every day she became more of a woman, a woman now every men had his eyes on. He told her that because it wasn't like them to keep secrets and anyway it was no secret, anything with an eye could see that men lusted for her. She got mad, furious she yelled at him and still this day he had no idea why she got all so mad. She pushed him but he didn't even move an inch and from her expression he could see that her hands hurt. He hold them and pulled her closer instantly and then they shared the longest look they shared. Like they were seeing each other for the first time, like they were seeing the world, the colors for the first time. The anger in her eyes slowly faded and he wanted to kiss her but he didn't. He backed away a little and let her hands go and murmured something bossy or brotherly and Arya stormed off.

As his nostalgia took him for a painful trip, he realized the other reason for her sadness. That foul excuse of a lord probably wanted her in a way that Gendry never expressed his enthusiasm for, Gendry rarely let Arya know that he acknowledged the fact that she was a girl. Now, Arya felt sad because Gendry wasn't the one to acknowledge that she is no longer a little child, but a young woman and for that he hated every part of him. He pitied the coward in him, it was cowardly of him not to let himself see her for who she was, let his feelings be but the more he oppress his feelings, the more they became stronger but what was the use of strong feelings if he couldn't express them? He was late, too late now and those feelings would leave an regret for his unfulfillable desires.

His heart burn as if someone was stabbing it with fiery hot metal. He wanted to rip out his heart and scream his lungs out but instead he sat by the fizzling fire, his head in his hands, slowly rocking. Another memory hit him and it was the last time he saw her. They were in a taverna near Winterfell and they both drank more then they should but the alcohol didn't do its job right that night. He remembered a girl checking him out and passing by him just to brush her arms against his back and Arya got jealous as Gendry got more cocky. His self-esteem was boasting but nothing happened, not with that girl nor with any other one. Arya sneaked next to him like a cat, at the end of the night and Gendry said something that was supposed to be funny and she said as keen as her sword,

"If you're so funny then why are you on your own tonight ?" and the next morning, she was gone.

He drank up all his beer but it didn't wash away his gloom. Next morning he climbed out of an empty, cold bed and his future lay before his eyes. Arya was going to marry that man, even she couldn't get herself out of this and in time she'd learn to love him but he would never love any other woman. He would be haunted by the ghost of the woman he never had. The relationship he never cherished would never leave his side. His mind wondered to "_it_" again. It was over and it had never really began, but still he decided to go to Winterfell. Where else could he go? He had to see it for himself Arya Stark getting married, becoming a wife, someone else's wife. The decision had taken one week, one sleepless week, but it was made.

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As he rode to Winterfell, he realized, he would sleep alone that night while she was in someone else's arms, but he had his triumphs. The triumphs he hated now because they were won away from her, they were won because he stayed with the Brotherhood as he watched her leave.

He had been just on time. The wedding was taking place, Arya was in a beautiful wedding gown and her light made everything else duller and darker. She shined with beauty but not with gleam. "It shouldn't have been this way," he thought. "A bride must be happy and in love. In love with a love that is natural and real, but not for you my Arya, not tonight." he thought and their eyes met in all that crowd. It seemed impossible for her to spot him but she did and for a moment happiness sparkled in her sad eyes only to create more sadness and he wanted to run to her, hold her like he never did and lift her, place her behind him on his horse and rode away, be her hero for the first and the last time in his life and the thought of trying it ,even though he would die without even succeeding to hold her hand ,has crossed his mind, made his insides burn and his head turn. For a moment he lost his every sense about right and wrong but before he could act on anything, the soft and graceful chant of the wedding singers ended and the ceremony started. He caught her gaze again and her gloom, her mournful look, stroke him by his heart and he wanted to cry, he wanted to cry out her name but he was dead and his last words were:

"Sad veiled bride, please be happy."

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**A/N:** Thank you so much for reading, a review would be lovely. :)


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